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The Edgetacular Adventures of the Raven Stakes
The Edgetacular Adventures of the Raven Stakes is a short film that was released on AlternativeReality.com. It's considered canonical to The Halloween Kids: Next Generation and is presented as a pilot for a fake series that never aired and was produced with minimal involvement from the Stakes beyond them approving the usage of their name and image. This was the first short to ever air on AlternativeReality.com, and was the last production completed by Strange before he left Canada and moved to South Carolina. Summary The short is presented as an in-show series and a parody of shows that rely on style over substance. Plot The series features the Raven Stakes, with the forced addition of an African American character for diversity reasons fighting a generic all-powerful villain with the stakes going on constant angsty rants before devolving to cringeworthy comedic moments. The ending is offset by this comedy after a dramatic final fight and everyone goes about their business as if nothing happened. Commentary A specialized commentary of the short, done by Roger Dunn and Howard Jerome (Cosmo Kadic and Bob Dixon respectively) was released as part of the special The Halloween Kids After Party Bonanza. Dig It!. Both do the commentary in character as if it was real. They claim that a now-defunct company offered to pay them three-million dollars to use their likeness in a TV show, only for both to learn that the money was dumped into the animation and little else. Both tear apart the pilot for its style and its conflicting tones, as well as an unremarkable villain, them going for a fake villain when both went after documented enemies in the past. Bob shows immense frustration at the inclusion of a black character for no reason other than for diversity purposes and that the character has no personality, yet manages to have all the aspects of a gary-stu. Cosmo is more infuriated over the fact that he had to give them money yet it was never vice versa, and he goes on a rant attacking everyone in the credits. Both calm down and Cosmo wants to blame Kerry for the whole thing, but Bob thinks he's crazy for thinking it, until a vanity logo revealing Kerry's name appears. A promo for another series, Road Animals, then plays and both conclude that they'd rather watch that series, with Bob going on about how the shark girl reminds him of his wife when she wore a bandana in her biker days, and that it influenced Colleen to don her cap as a signature part of her outfit. Cosmo then claims that Marie wanted to cut her hand off to be like Daphne, who lost her hand in combat, but Bob cuts him off since there's nothing more to commentate on. Trivia * To illustrate that the show's money was poured into the design, Strange brought on a group of interns to do the voice work. None are credited by name. * A reference to the Quantum Leap episode "Jimmy" is made when Cosmo compares one of the developers to Jimmy LaMotta. * It's implied that Cosmo no longer works as a principal. He claimed that the schools were ran independently by principals, so it's possible he left on his own volition. * Another hint into Enid's personal life is revealed when Bob claims she used to belong to a biker gang. The placement of this is unknown, though it's possibly between her adult film career and her protest days. * Road Animals was actually a very early pilot Strange worked on that never got completed. * Strange's decision to include the commentary as part of a different special was done because he felt that the original episode and the commentary being uploaded together would be redundant.